1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a printing apparatus such as that of a laser printer, a duplicator, a facsimile apparatus or the like. The present invention, in particular, relates to a printing apparatus which prints cutting marks together with an ordinary image.
The cutting marks will now be described. A printing manner may be requested in which an image fills an entire area of the paper sheet so that no blank space is present on the periphery of the paper sheet. Such a request may arise when a magazine, a poster, or the like is to be printed. However, in view of a printing technique of an ordinary printing apparatus such as an ordinary laser printer, it is difficult to print the image on the predetermined size of paper sheet in a manner in which each side of the four sides of the image (having a rectangle outline shape) is coincident with a respective side of the four sides of the predetermined size of paper sheet (having the same rectangle outline shape).
Therefore, in order to achieve the above-mentioned printing manner, a method will now be described with reference to FIG. 1. First, a large-size paper sheet 14, which large size is larger than the above-mentioned predetermined size, is prepared. Then, an image 15 is printed on the large-size paper sheet 14 at the middle thereof and thus a certain blank space is left in a periphery portion 14a of the large-size paper sheet 14 after the printing as shown in the figure. Then, the periphery portion 14a is cut off from the large-size paper sheet 14 having the image 15 printed thereon so that the above-mentioned certain blank space is eliminated and thus the image 15 fills the entire area of a resulting paper sheet 14b. The resulting paper sheet 14b is a paper sheet obtained as a result of the periphery portion being cut off as mentioned above.
For this purpose, a worker manually draws cutting marks 18 on the large-size paper sheet 14 as shown in the figure. The cutting marks 18 are preferably set off from the image 15 by a predetermined distance d (e.g., 3 mm). These cutting marks 18 are used as reference indexes for cutting lines used in the above-mentioned periphery portion cutting off operation.
2. Description of the Related Art
It is possible to provide a printing apparatus which includes a function of printing such cutting marks together with an ordinary image.
Generally speaking, a printing apparatus, for example, includes a paper holding unit comprising a paper cassette or the like for holding multiple sheets of blank paper. Further, a paper carrying mechanism such as a feed roller of the apparatus carries the thus-held multiple sheets of blank paper sheet by sheet. The printing apparatus further includes an image printing mechanism consisting of a laser scanner, a photosensitive drum element, a electrifying charger, a developer, an eraser, a transferring charger, and so forth, in a case of a laser printer, or an ink-jet head, platen roller and so forth, in a case of an ink-jet printer. Such an image printing mechanism prints various images on the multiple sheets of blank paper one by one. In addition, a cutting mark printing mechanism is provided for printing cutting marks on the multiple sheets of blank paper sheet by sheet, either after or before the above-mentioned printing of various images. It is possible to provided a common printing mechanism which is used not only for printing the various images but also for printing the cutting marks.
In the above-described structure of the printing apparatus, the printing mechanism prints the various images together with the cutting marks on the multiple sheets of blank paper which are fed thereto by the paper carrying mechanism sheet by sheet. Thus, the printing apparatus supplies multiple sheets of printed paper, each of which has an image of the various images printed at the middle thereof and cutting marks printed at a periphery portion thereof. Then, a worker may cut out the periphery portions from the multiple sheets of printed paper according to the printed cutting marks. Thus, multiple sheets of paper are obtained, each of which has an image of the various images printed thereon and which image fills the entire area thereof.
There may be a case where such a printing apparatus is connected to a work station and receives an image signal from the work station. The image signal includes data representing cutting marks in addition to ordinary various images and thus the printing apparatus receiving the image signal prints out the data representing the cutting marks and ordinary various images. Thus, the printing apparatus supplies multiple sheets of printed paper, each of which has an image of the ordinary various images together with the cutting marks.
Further, it is also possible that the printing apparatus receives an image signal having data representing ordinary various images and another image signal having data representing cutting marks. The printing apparatus receiving the two image signals prints out the data representing the cutting marks and data representing ordinary various images either through an ordinary image printing mechanism and a separate cutting mark printing mechanism or through a common ordinary image and cutting mark printing mechanism. Thus, the printing apparatus supplies multiple sheets of printed paper, each of which has an image of the ordinary various images together with cutting marks.
Generally speaking, such multiple sheets of printed paper, each of which has an image of the ordinary various images together with cutting marks, will not be cut sheet by sheet but will be cut at the same all together. That is, the multiple sheets of printed paper are stacked up and then a large cutter is used to cut the stacked multiple sheets of paper. Therefore, it is not necessary to print cutting marks on all of the multiple sheets of paper, but it is only necessary to print them on a top sheet of the stacked multiple sheets of paper. Thus, printing cutting marks on all sheets of the multiple sheets of paper fruitlessly increases image processing time and also causes extra printing toner/ink to be consumed.
Further, in a printing technique of an ordinary printing apparatus such as an ordinary laser printer, an accuracy in adjustment of a location of an image being printed with respect to a location of a sheet of blank paper is not so high. Therefore, an error may occur in printing locations of cutting marks between multiple sheets of printed paper.
If no such an error occurs, even if stacked ones of the multiple sheets of printed paper are cut at the same time all together according to cutting marks printed on the top one of the stacked multiple sheets of paper using a large cutter, the printed cutting marks are not substantially left in an inner area of each sheet of printed paper which has been obtained as a result of periphery portions of the stacked multiple sheets of paper being cut off. This is because the large cutter cuts the multiple sheets of paper at positions at which the cutting marks are printed and thus the marks are cut off. If part of the marks is left, the part of the marks is present only just at the edge of the multiple sheets and thus it cannot be recognized ordinarily.
However, if such an error occurs, after the stacked multiple sheets of printed paper have been cut at the same time all together according to the cutting marks printed on the top one of the stacked multiple sheets of paper using the large cutter, the printed cutting marks may be left in an inner area of some sheets of the resulting multiple sheets of printed paper other than the top sheet.